As electronic devices have become more prevalent, worries about their safety and security have also increased. Both manufacturers and consumers are forced to rely on the integrity of various, and often nebulous, distribution chains. Electronic devices are susceptible to various physical alterations by third parties. These alternations can go undetected by a consumer. Small apparatus are well known which can be integrated into an electronic device prior to receipt by a consumer. In addition, many electronic devices now contain software resident in memory on the device itself. Third parties can modify the software or place additional software in the memory for various reasons. A user has no way to guarantee that their new device has not been used since leaving the manufacturer.
These security flaws in current devices have resulted in the consumers having no way to determine if the “new” device they are purchasing is actually new and unadulterated or has not been modified since leaving the factory. This issue raises at least two concerns. First, consumers want to be sure that they are getting what they pay for, i.e. a new device. The second concern is that, between the manufacturer and the consumer, some third party will alter the device in a nefarious manner, such as for the collecting and transmitting of personal data.
Driving the first concern is the fact that consumers do not want to receive a refurbished or used product which is packaged as a new product. A related concern is that manufacturers want to ensure that consumers are purchasing new legitimate goods, not counterfeit or copycat goods.
The second concern has become particularly important, as electronic devices have become a repository for personal information. A device may be transferred between numerous parties from the moment it leaves the manufacturer to the ultimate receipt by a consumer. This provides opportunities for a third party to alter the electronic device as discussed above. In such a situation, the device may boot up normally as if booting up for the first time, even though it has been tampered with before purchase by the user. Spyware can be inserted into the device and silently monitors the user's keypresses. The user could then start an application which uses credit cards or banking information, and the spyware can capture the user's PIN or passcode and reads/records the data content of the application. At some point during a subsequent network connection, the spyware can transmit the captured personal or private information back to a base where it can be retrieved. The user would be unaware of the spyware transmission, since it happens during normal network activity anyways. In this situation, the normal network activity icon does not help the user identify the spyware transmission.
Thus, a need exists for an electronic device which is capable of detecting use following manufacture. The startup detection mechanism itself needs to be resistant to tampering to insure the integrity of the system. The startup mechanism needs to be secure enough to address the use of software by a third party to modify the electronic device.